Is it illegal to watch movies online?

RobTang

Soubrette wrote: »

I would be interested if you could come up with something a bit more substantial than conjecture.

Your argument is totaly based on the assumption that a partial copy isn't a proper copy. If i leave the

And watching a movie piecemeal is most definatly NOT in the spirit of the fair use laws, your putter it forward as a reason why it might be legal but its not relevent in this situation.

IF you dont want conjecture, the cache is (by defination) accessable (or you wouldn't be able to watch it) and you can access it outside of the flashplayer. temporary files are not automaticlly overwritten (as soon as after you have watched your bit), I've have flash files that have been in there for years.

vitamin_joe

...edit...

roddydogs

Marty_J wrote: »

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BitTorrent_(protocol)

Yes, but how do you use a "Torrent" instead of "Normal" ?

Soubrette

RobTang wrote: »

Your argument is totaly based on the assumption that a partial copy isn't a proper copy. If i leave the

No, my argument is partially that

It is also that I can find no explicit mention of watching a stream being illegal anywhere.

I can find no mention of it being implicitly mentioned or hinted at that it is illegal either.

Propaganda news items (by that I mean something put out to put a point of view rather than an unbiased piece of reporting) by the Premier League focus exclusively on the illegality of the sites. Link in one of my previous posts

No person here has put forward any actual evidence that streaming is illegal, I know people feel strongly that it is illegal, ought to be illegal but there has been nothing stronger than that.

The BBC itself has said that you are safer streaming that downloading (link in one of my previous posts)

And watching a movie piecemeal is most definatly NOT in the spirit of the fair use laws, your putter it forward as a reason why it might be legal but its not relevent in this situation.

LEAVE THE FAIR USE PART OF YOUR ARGUMENT ALONE ALREADY AS NO ONE HAS SAID IT IS FAIR USE OR PUT THAT FORWARD THAT AS PART OF THEIR ARGUMENT. Hmmm can I put this any more plainly? - I don't think so but I will try. The law already has provision (or precedent if you like) that not all copying is illegal (and not just for fair use there are other situations too so please put that out of your mind, fair use was an example, not part of my argument). You cannot therefore put forward the argument that having a temporary copy of a part of something is automatically illegal.

In the same way that I hope I have shown Marty that the law has provision that the beneficiary of an illegal act is not always acting illegally - is this a killer blow for your argument? No of course not because the law also has provision that sometimes an innocent beneficiary is guilty of an illegal act - the ignorance of the law is no excuse clause. So again we are left with a grey area. However it does show that you cannot put forward the argument that because offering a stream on a website is illegal it is automatically illegal to watch one.

However I will slightly amend the first part of your argument and put it in even stronger terms - watching a stream is against the spirit of copyright, I have no doubt about that but I am not arguing the morality of the sitation - I am really only interested in whether it is actually illegal.

IF you dont want conjecture, the cache is (by defination) accessable (or you wouldn't be able to watch it) and you can access it outside of the flashplayer. temporary files are not automaticlly overwritten (as soon as after you have watched your bit), I've have flash files that have been in there for years.

That is more like it

Tell me how accessing the file can be done (linking to a site is acceptable) - I have read that some people are able to copy the stream but I assumed they'd somehow 'caught' it while streaming - this would obviously be illegal.

It's no dice telling me that just by watching once it you are accessing something - I do that on my tv and radio all the time and that is not copying. The word copy implies I can access something at will doesn't it?

So what I want to know is, can you access those files and watch that film again in any way shape or form? Now that would be a strong argument that it is a copy in the legal sense of the word . If the answer (as I strong suspect) is no, then I'd love for you to explain exactly what you can access on a multiple basis and what it would look like from a viewers point of view.

However, if you show me that it is a copy in the legal sense of the word then you also have to explain why this appears to be only in your opinion - why has big business not picked up on this fact to shut down streaming/put pressure on the ISPs, taken people to court etc in the same way that they have for downloading?

That's the problem with an argument based on a set of ideas - if you are arguing against them and want any hope of persuading someone that you are right then you have to find something that fits all the facts. Not just pick and choose the ones you think you can disprove but ignore the rest.

Sou

Paradigm

Love your work Soubrette

I must admit I've always thought that watching illegally streamed material was, in itself, illegal.

Like you, but not to the same extent, I've been poking around looking for a definative answer &, like you, I can't find one. It does indeed seem to be a grey area.

On the subject of the streaming cache.....

Having never watched a full length film via a streaming site I'm not sure how they cache but some streaming sites, certainly UTube, cache the whole clip & as long as the browser window remains open the clip can be replayed without re-downloading.
Close the browser & access to that clip is lost!

I know this is splitting hairs but if all streaming sites cache in the same way then for the duration of the browser window you have access to a full "copy" which could be deemed an illegal download(?) How this could be proved I don't know?

Millionaire

Paradigm wrote: »

On the subject of the streaming cache.....

Having never watched a full length film via a streaming site I'm not sure how they cache but some streaming sites, certainly UTube, cache the whole clip & as long as the browser window remains open the clip can be replayed without re-downloading.
Close the browser & access to that clip is lost!

Just to clear up, A whole film can be cached on your system from a streamed source. Also it is accessible if you know where to look, and can be saved if required.

Halcyonman

anewhope wrote: »

There are ramifications for the actions, but I think a lot of people are burying their head in the sand over the severity of what actually could happen, though there is almost safety in numbers because it is impractical and expensive to pursue individuals. Just depends how your moral compass is aligned though I guess, some can appreciate something for it's value while others just snatch all they can.

I believe most people do make a 'grey' moral distinction when downloading copyright material. Here's a hypothetical example, would I copy a CD from a struggling local band? No. Would I watch a streamed version of the latest Harry Potter film linked at tv-links.cc that has already made squillions of profit for the producers? Yes. The part of your post that everyone should think about is it's, "impractical and expensive to pursue individuals". Please bare this in mind when you see the latest P2P convictions story in the mainstream media designed to scare you witless. Copyright law in the UK is a bit like the Libel laws. It only pays to bring a case against someone when they have money to take from them. If you are on a low income then they are unlikely to come after you, if you have cash then you should buy it! It's that simple.

Marty_J

Halcyonman wrote: »

Here's a hypothetical example, would I copy a CD from a struggling local band? No. Would I watch a streamed version of the latest Harry Potter film linked at tv-links.cc that has already made squillions of profit for the producers? Yes.

You're truly a modern day Robin Hood. :rolleyes:

Copyright law in the UK is a bit like the Libel laws. It only pays to bring a case against someone when they have money to take from them. If you are on a low income then they are unlikely to come after you, if you have cash then you should buy it! It's that simple.

They don't know anything about you before they instruct their lawyers to send you a letter informing you that your a$$ is being taken to the cleaners.

That's why they sue 12 year old girls.

Soubrette

Millionaire wrote: »

Just to clear up, A whole film can be cached on your system from a streamed source. Also it is accessible if you know where to look, and can be saved if required.

Actually you haven't cleared it up at all for me - I cannot find one single site that backs up what you're saying about a whole film being cached.

http://research.unc.edu/endeavors/spr2006/folkstreams.php

Unlike downloading the video — which takes longer than most of us are willing to wait and could lead to infringement on the ownership rights of the filmmaker — video streaming buffers the film a few seconds ahead of itself so that you can watch the video as it’s coming to your computer. Your hard drive then discards what you’ve already watched. With video streaming, the film “is only temporarily passing through your computer

American site so don't get too excited 'streaming is legal' brigade

http://computer.howstuffworks.com/streaming-video-and-audio.htm/printable

Regardless of whether it's an applet or a fully functional player, the program playing the streaming file discards the data as you watch. A full copy of the file never exists on your computer, so you can't save it for later

http://www.its.uiowa.edu/tns/videoservices/streamdef.htm

No copy of the entire program is stored on the computer being used for viewing.

http://www.virginmedia.com/digital/digitalhome/essentialguides/streamingmedia.php

It is usually, though not always, possible to record the stream that is delivered to your computer. Many content providers try to avoid you doing this as far as possible, by encrypting the stream or using a weird data format for example, because they're worried that recordings might be for distribution. However, recording for personal use is perfectly legal.

This site does confirm that some streams can be recorded.

Even though it's virgin I'm not entirely sure that that last sentence can be true legally:eek:.

There are more but I'm bored of cut and pasting now

A person may well have the ability to save a stream but it appears to need certain downloads to do it. An average person with a computer watching online streams is almost certainly not going to be able to save the stream, would this be a fair thing to say? The ability to 'rip' a steam though is more a side issue - despite what Virgin appear to be saying I think I've read enough to be pretty sure that that is actually illegal.

If I choose to open a cached file in my temporary files what would I see? Let's say for arguments sake that it's 10 minutes worth of film - I open it up in my mediaplayer (the same player the website was using) - would I be able to see those 10 minutes? (I don't know the answer to this question but I'm very interested in the answer from someone who knows I might try it later with youtube

Paradigm - thank you for the compliment I hope you feel the same if we're ever on the opposite side of a discussion . As to what you're saying about the cache file - I honestly don't know, like I've said before, the area is grey enough that I wouldn't like to be defending myself in court about it. Also it really is just conjecture - I know I've been accused of this being the main reason why I believe streaming is legal but it is actually not - it's more my hypothesis about why it seems to be legal in the absence of any definitive evidence of illegality on the web. I only feel this is a persuasive indicator because we have no doubt for example, that hosting a stream is illegal, if watching a stream was the same, I think we'd have no doubt about that too.

However I still think that if whatever was on your computer was a definitive and legal copy of something with copyright then there would not be any doubt - it would be illegal <

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conjecture again

Halcyconman - I think they used to think that in the US before the RIAA started showing it's teeth.

Sou

Marty_J

Soubrette wrote: »

If I choose to open a cached file in my temporary files what would I see? Let's say for arguments sake that it's 10 minutes worth of film - I open it up in my mediaplayer (the same player the website was using) - would I be able to see those 10 minutes? (I don't know the answer to this question but I'm very interested in the answer from someone who knows I might try it later with youtube

It's certainly possible to retrieve (and play) YouTube videos from your browser's cache.

http://www.delete-computer-history.com/download-youtube-videos.html

It's even easier on a Mac.